Where the wild things go
by Mitos Secret
Summary: Cordelia and Conner are forced to flee from Angelus five years into the future
1. escape

Summary: This is au from where Conner goes to Quor'toth, he doesn't get sent there basically, Conner has been raised by angel and Cordelia. Five years down the line Angelus rears his un-ugly head and Cordelia is forced to take Conner and flee. My first Angel fic, so feedback is muchly appreciated. If you want to distribute this feel free, just drop me a line to say where. (Flash backs are signified by 2 sets of elipses and a double space, they end with the same format, I tried italics but they didn't show when I uploaded this)  
  
-end authors notes.  
  
*****  
  
Conner had sat in stony silence for the first 20 minutes or so. The silence was broken only by Cordy's heavy breathing, and the occasional sniff of sadness from Conner at being woken up in the night and being rushed from his safe, warm home, away from his Father. The adrenaline was still pumping fast through her veins. Cordelia couldn't help but take a few anxious glances behind her to make sure they weren't being followed. Any sensible person would have waited for the safety of daylight to escape, but as she had lain in her bed that night the fear crept slowly upon her until all she could think of was getting far, far away from the hyperion with her son, away from the monster that was his Father, and her beloved.  
  
It was inevitable Conner would question her actions some time; he was a bright young boy, for a five year old. So it came as no surprise when he piped up.  
  
"Where are we going Mommy?"  
  
Cordelia smiled her bravest smile for him.  
  
"Somewhere nice and sunny." She put a happy accent on her words, made it sound like they were going on a nice road trip together. Conner looked sceptically at the darkness around him, the only 'sun' was the neon glow coming from the seedy bar they were speeding past.   
  
"Are we going to the beech?" He was unsure of his words and a little frightened by the strange situation he found him self in.  
  
"No Conner, not the beech, somewhere… different, far away. From Daddy."  
The little boy's face scrunched up in confusion. Cordelia sighed; he didn't need to say anything for her to know she should explain further, with a sigh she struggled to explain.  
  
"Daddy did something very bad Conner, and, and we have to go away for a while until Daddy is good again, understand?" The young boy nodded and watched the world fly by the window.   
  
"Mommy?"  
"Yes Conner?"  
"Are you driving too fast?"  
"Um, well yeah."  
"Isn't that bad?"  
"Well, normally yes it is very bad and sometimes a nasty police man or woman will stop you and give you a ticket and then you have to give them money, which we need, which is why you mustn't go very fast in a car unless its very important."  
Conner once again nodded. He thought for a little while about the complexities of the world before speaking up again.  
"You always tell Daddy off if he goes too fast. Even when it was really important like when Uncle Charlie had to go to the oraceles."  
"Well that's different, I'm careful when I speed, Daddy just isn't. Besides I'm a bit upset right now Conner so I'm allowed to be irrational."  
"Because Mommy has perwiod's?"  
Cordelia couldn't help but smile a little at Conner's innocence; she really needed to stop subjecting the poor kid to her life philosophies. She mused that he wasn't even in kindergarten and he already knew all about vampires, demons, hell mouths and how cheap blondes were to be avoided at all costs.  
  
Eventually her nerves calmed enough to allow her to slow down and Conner drifted off into a peaceful sleep, lulled there by the motion of the car and the purring of the engine. Dawn was just beginning to break and Cordelia felt herself become slowly wearier, she gathered she was around 145 kilometres from LA by now, just approaching Santa Barbara, was that enough distance? He'd come after them once he realised they were gone, of that much she was sure. She expected this really, when Conner was just a few months old he had almost been lost, the resurrected vampire hunter Holtz had stolen him From Wesley and nearly taken him to a hell dimension, if she hadn't come back from holiday just then…...  
  
  
...…Cordelia screamed as Saihjhan opened the portal to Quor'toth. It was her vision all over again but this time it was more terrifying, because it was really happening, Conner was really being taken away. Groo beside her in her hastily parked jeep tried to restrain her. He could not. She leapt from the safety of the jeep and hurtled forward. She saw Angel be hurled backwards by a bolt of lightening and Holtz step through the portal. She screamed again, in terror as the reality of the situation struck home, she fell to her knees, arms reaching to Sahjhan. From those arms a white light erupted, her eyes grew wide in shock as the beam destroyed Sahjhan and closed the portal, Holtz was thrown backwards, landing hard and probably breaking his neck in the process. Conner was thrown up in the air, his white baby blanket slipping from under him. Cordelia sobbed as he fell to the ground, sure that the impact would crush his tiny body. Angel was up and rushing towards him, the others, too shocked to act. Every thing seemed to be moving in slow motion. He wouldn't make it the baby would still die. Cordy closed her eyes to shut out the sight. She didn't hear any screams, or Angel's cries as she had in the vision; she cracked on eye open, then both, unable to believe the sight. The baby was floating mere inches from the ground, gurgling to himself. Cordelia smiled and the baby dropped harmlessly to the ground. "Way to go demon me." she muttered. Conner was now crying and Angel was laughing as he held him in his arms, with relief and joy. Cordelia stood and went to Angel's side to smile down on Conner. Angel thanked her with a kiss that lasted perhaps too long for people who were just friends......  
  
  
...…They waited nearly a year after that day before doing the 'deed', having sex. They'd been so scared they'd practically fumbled through and unlike most people her age instead of a condom for protection Cordelia took some holy water and a stake with her. Angel had been so happy when he hadn't lost his soul he almost put it at risk. Angel was smiling a lot lately and whilst he wasn't perfectly happy he was very, very content. The years went by and Conner began to crawl and walk and talk, and play miniature hockey; Well sort of. Who would have thought such a simple thing as a school assignment would have released Angelus…...  
  
  
...… Conner's class had to talk about their hero, after class had come home to tell a beaming Angel and I that he had chosen us, he had been the only boy in his class to choose his parents. He looked up into Angel's eyes with such devotion and love tears of joy came to my eyes. Conner said, "Daddy, you Mommy are the best Mommy and Daddy in the whole world." Conner skipped off as I turned with a grin to find Angel hunched over toward the floor. I knew, I just knew today was the day we had all been dreading. Eventually Angel stood up. His eyes had a strange watery look, he gave me a weak smile, I could hear him breathing, see a slight sheen of perspiration on his upper lip. I had to believe he was still him, what else could I have done? I called his name, worried. He looked at me confused before something passed over his eyes and a slow smile spread over his lips. He blinked once slowly, enjoying the sensation of the world slowly changing to blackness. Then he came forward, powerful in the one stride it took to reach me and pull me close. "I'm fine," his smile spread, "Better than fine." He kissed me, passionately, as he always did, but there was something else there, an insistency, like it was the first time we'd kissed. It lasted far too long for just a normal kiss. As he pulled away I gasped for breath and frowned lightly at him, my eyes boring into his, searching. He caressed my cheek. "Cor, you worry too much." I stood mouthing my new nickname to my self "Cor?" as I watched him saunter upstairs.   
  
The day went as usual, at the end of it Angel investigations went home and Angel and I tucked Conner into bed. That night Angel was so insistent about making love, like, he needed it so bad or something, it worried me, so I shrugged him off. He shouted at me, nothing bad, more and angry grunt, or much more terrifyingly, a growl. He fell asleep in the end, his hand resting on my breast, nose tucked into the crook of my neck. I had to repress a sob. I knew what he was now I couldn't deny it. I eased out of bed as soon as I felt I could. Sneaking around our creaky bedroom was so incredibly scary, all I wanted to do was fall down and cry, but I had to get my son out of there and away as fast as I could, before we couldn't. Before he decided not to let us. The hinges on the wardrobe seemed like tomcats screeching and I jumped when a car drove past outside and its light shone on his slumbering figure. I had to silence Conner when I woke him to stop him crying, we took his favourite bear with us, A vampire slayer bear that Dawn had made for him on his fourth birthday…...  
  
  
...…Cordelia's thoughts snapped back to the present and she realised she was slipping off into the land of nod. Shaking her self-awake she suddenly thought of warning her friends. Wesley, she'd call Wesley. She reached for her hands free cell-phone and hit the speed dial for Wes. There was a pregnant silence before the connections struck home and the phone started ringing, impatiently she growled out "Pick up the phone, Wes, pick up the phone." Eventually a groggy sounding Wesley answered. "Hello?" "Wesley, oh Thank God!"   
"Cordelia, what's wrong, did you have a vision."  
"Pfft, I wish!"  
"Well then…"  
"Oh Wes!" She couldn't help herself she broke into quiet sobs, Wesley waited for her to calm down.  
"I'm on the freeway Wesley, I had to get out of there."  
"Did- did you and Angel have a-a fight? Or er…" Dealing with hysterical Cordelia after she got pissed at Angel had never been his strong point.  
"No. No, I, oh, God." She had to bite the bullet sometime.   
"He's, I think, he's. Wesley I think Angelus is back."   
Stunned silence was her companion's only reply. Cordelia pressed on. "It's, well Conner said something today, well yesterday now and it, Angel was so happy, but them he was on the floor and he looked so strange, and it was like, he wasn't Angel anymore, but he didn't do anything like, evil, but I know, somehow, I just know that he's not… Maybe it's my demony powers."  
  
Wesley answered with many reassurances and 'Dear Lords'. Whilst Wesley went through some possible ways to restore Angel's soul Cordelia slowed the car and pulled into the turning of a motel, 'the lucky lady'.   
  
"No, Conner's fine, he's with me."   
  
Cordelia answered Wesley's latest half-heard question.   
"We're gonna stay at the motel in Santa Barbara. Will you tell Gunn and Fred, you all need to stay out of his way, make sure he doesn't hurt anyone, I dunno, maybe he isn't Angelus, maybe I'm just paranoid, but I have to be sure, for Conner's sake."   
Wesley gave her his promise and started to say his goodbyes, but Cordelia interrupted.   
"Oh, and Wes, tell Buffy, he might go after her again, she deserves to know if she's in danger."   
"Of course." Wesley agreed.   
  
By now Cordelia had parked and was waking Conner.   
  
"Looks like we'll be staying her for a while hun." 


	2. awakenings

In the outside world the sun was shining and the birds were singing but in his own little world, curled up by his girl everything was just perfect. The sun had arisen hours ago. Angelus mused on the fact that after all these years dormant he should be so sleepy, he stretched languidly, hearing the bed creak as he moved. Reaching out across to Cordelia's sleeping space with a lazy smile he realised he couldn't smell her. Her smell had been so poignant last night he could almost taste it, had to control himself, not to bite her, not to take her. The soul's love was strong on her and there was nothing he liked more on a woman than his own scent. Why had he toyed with her last night? It had seemed the thing to do, at the time, she hadn't realised the Angel creature was gone, and he had taken its place.   
  
She must be up already, probably heating him up some blood. Wrapping Conner up warm. He smiled and breathed in the heady scent of her on the pillow next to him. Blood was always best when it came from someone you loved.   
  
Love. It was an interesting concept to him. The soul had claimed that Angelus couldn't love. Yet, what he was feeling now was pretty damn intense, and if this wasn't love, hell had frozen over. Then again, maybe it was just residual affects. His lover and his son, he was sure he loved them; he knew they were his, at any rate. He suddenly felt an intense need to be around them. To feel their warmth, let them know how he felt. Maybe give Conner a little taste of torture, after all didn't the kid want to grow up to be just like his old man? With a smile he slipped into the black jeans he tossed to the floor last night. Angelus scrunched his face up in disgust, there was something moist in the pocket, reaching in he pulled out a half melted crayon, his jeans had been near the heating pipe all night. He looked at the thing in disgust; it was a sickly dull orange colour, definitely not the brightest crayon in the box. Angelus narrowed his eyes as he snapped the crayon between his thumb and forefinger; he tossed it against the wall and smirked at it. Bare-chested he stalked from the room where Cordy's scent lingered and stopped at his son's door, listening for sounds of movement inside. There were none. Frowning slightly he made his way down to the lobby of the Hyperion. "Damn shame, I wanted Cordy alone when I told her."  
  
***  
  
Cordy smiled at Conner wistfully, he was sitting in the small, motel room playing with his only toys, an action man, disguised as a vampire and his 'Buffy bear'. Yesterday Conner had tried to make the 'vampire' more authentic by drawing blood orange around its mouth with a crayon. Angel had reprimanded him and taken the crayon. Explaining later to his young son that they got all the evil vampires before they could get blood on them. Angel, it hurt to think that only a few minutes after the crayon incident took place Angel had been lost. Cordelia sighed deeply. "Hey Conner. You ok?" The little boy nodded yes. "C'mere." Cordy called him over to her and enveloped him in a hug, tears springing to her eyes she mumbled a soft mantra into Conner's hair as she stroked it flat. "We'll get him back, we'll get him back…"  
  
***  
  
"Honey…" Angelus growled slightly, deep in his throat when he received no answer. "Come out, come out where ever you are." He pulled in unneeded air through his nose, smelling for Cordelia. Where she was the child would be too. Nothing, not even a lingering scent of the vanilla soap she had smelt of last night. This wasn't right. Angelus' glanced at the wall clock, 11am. Surely the rest of his little teammates should be here by now. He spun round, his keen senses listening for any movement, smelling and looking for any thing that would indicate the presence of human or demon. Nothing. "Okay, Getting severely pissed off now!" His voice rose in decibels as he finished the sentence. "Damn it!" How, could she have know, he'd acted perfectly normal, Nicole bloody Kidman couldn't have done any better.   
  
He stormed into his office, slamming the door so hard behind him that the glass plane shattered, the glass chinked and tingled as it crashed to the ground, Angelus closed his eyes for a moment, savouring the sound his destruction caused. He walked to his desk and picked up a framed photo of Cordelia and Conner. He removed the picture and tossed the frame aside before tucking the photo in his back pocket, where the crayon had previously lived. He stood contemplating for a while before bringing his fist forcefully down on the desk with a vicious snarl. He excited his office and made his way down to the basement and the sewage tunnels, maybe his dear friend Wesley would know where they were.  
  
***  
  
Fred felt numb, completely, all over. Things between Cordy and Angel were so great she'd forgotten that Angel even could loose his soul. They'd found a loophole in the curse; Angel was so worried about loosing his soul in whatever he did that he could never experience that moment of perfect happiness. Fred had never seen Angel evil; sure she'd seen him loose control a bit. But never was he soulless. It staggered her, that one minute he could be good and kind and the next, a thing, evil and unfeeling. But that wasn't true; vampires could feel things, couldn't they? Charles snapped her out of her reverie by leaning over the back of the sofa she was seated on and kissing the flesh near her temple. "I come, bearing sandwiches." She smiled at him and looked back to the assortment of books and papers scattered around their coffee table.  
"How did this happen Charles?" It was more of a statement than a question but he answered anyway.   
"I guess we all got a little cocky. Deep down though I guess we were all prepared for this day, in some way."  
"Yeah." She agreed with him as she looked at the books that had been gathering in her and Gunn's shared apartment over the last few years, books on Angelus, and soul restoration and curses. Wesley was out hunting for a few magical items they could maybe use, hunting the black-market and demon hideouts, even a few brick-or-brack stores. It was all down to them and so far they had found nothing of use, nor had they heard any more from Cordy, or seen any sign of Angelus. Gunn perched himself on the sofa next to her and peered at the book she was reading. A knock on the door startled them both. Fred rose and went to the door, opening it a crack, enough for her to peek out. It was Angel, standing there with a small anxious smile. Confusion flickered across Fred's face as she opened the door wider, he certainly didn't look evil. By now Gunn had joined her at the door, he clenched his teeth when he saw Angel standing there.  
  
"Angel." One word filled with such emotion, and uncertainty.  
"Gunn… and Fred! Well, what do you know, we all know each others names, isn't that jolly nice." The vampire graced them with a broad grin. The smile was hollow it didn't reach his eyes.  
"So I seem to have misplaced a few members of my household, you wouldn't by any chance be hiding them in there would you." Angelus pushed the door open further, surprised when his arm was able to enter Fred and Gunn's apartment, he was even more surprised when he found a spike jammed into the hand holding the door.  
"Shit!" He withdrew his hand and tore out the stake.  
"Now boy, that was rude." He addressed Gunn as he stepped through the threshold, the couple stepped back, anxious, but with crossbows at the ready none the less.   
"Man you come any further and friend or no friend you're only gonna be so much dust to sweep under the rug."   
Angelus glanced around him, the floor was littered with Fred's vamp dusting contraptions, some of them voice activated, some with tranquillisers, who knew what the rest did. Facing him off was an angry Gunn and a confused Winifred. The odds were definitely stacked against him.  
"Ok," A short pause to grace them with a smile "Let me 'level' with you Gunn, I just want my 'bitch' back you 'dig' 'dog'. So tell me where Cordelia is and we can forget any of this ever happened."  
"Oh, no you did not just mock my speech, get out. Now." Charles Gunn launched his crossbow; the arrow hit its mark just above the vampire's heart. Immediately Angelus morphed into game face. Being punctured whilst visiting chums was not what he'd had in mind. He advanced towards them but stopped as Fred positioned her foot on the trigger of one of her favourite toys, a pellet shooter, each wooden 'bullet' soaked with holy water. That would hurt, that would hurt a lot. Angelus slipped out of game face and turned a pleading look toward Fred. She had always been so trusting.   
  
"Fred, come on, please, you know me, and I wont hurt them. I… just want to know their… safe."  
He saw her tough demeanour start to crack. She opened her mouth to speak but Gunn, always the action hero shot another cross bow, this one dangerously close to his groin area.   
"Out!" Angelus cocked his head thoughtfully to the side before backing up out of the apartment; he kept his pleading gaze on Fred the whole time. At last she called out, only it wasn't quite what he wanted to hear.  
"Don't go to far Angel, you don't want to be stuck in some strange town when we get your soul back." Angelus growled as the door was slammed in his face.  
  
****  
  
A low rumbling growl could be heard emanating from the man keeping to the shadows on the empty streets. It was such an unpleasant day, clouds had appeared in the sky. One would assume a vampire would be happy, walking the streets at noon and all, but alas, this was not the case.  
  
He'd lingered for a while outside Fred and Gunn's apartment, listened to their heated conversation. The fact that he'd caused conflict between them gave him some small satisfaction but he couldn't help but wonder where it had all gone wrong. A vagrant sitting on a street corner stopped to ask him to spare some change. The change he received wasn't exactly what the dirty looking young man had in mind. Angelus grabbed the man by the neck and hoisted him to his feet, he glared at the man for a while, long and intense, amber eyes meeting dull grey ones. The man was so doped up he didn't even realise the danger he was in. As Angelus' teeth closed in on the vagrants jugular the scent of filth over whelmed him. The man had just enough sense to begin squirming as a sharp pair of fangs ripped his throat out. Angelus' didn't even bother to drink from him, the taste of drugs was vile in his mouth and instead of flowers to mark his passing the man who died on the streets memoriam was to have his own unclean blood spat back on him.   
  
A small smile reached his lips as he saw the blood bubble from the man's open wound. Angelus' found himself tutting at his own hastiness; it looked like the work of an amateur, too lazy to feed with dignity, class. "You really should watch what you eat" he remarked to a dieting poster on the wall above the new corpse, "You never will know who wants a taste."  
  
****  
  
Contemplating was not something Angelus found pleasurable. Sitting in the lobby of his hotel for the past hour or so planning his next move had not been on his agenda for the day. Funny thing with humans, no matter how dim witted they were they could still manage to surprise you. But then, he could recall one or two that suffered from the run-up-the-stairs-when-the-front-door-is-right-there syndrome, like some cheesy horror movie. He laid his head back and breathed in deep, it was nice to give his tired lungs an airing now and then. He was getting hungry. A few more moments lying there and he'd be up, heck maybe he'd just order a pizza boy. After all he needed time to recuperate from being shot repeatedly. What was that scent he was getting on the air? The smell of dust and age was about, the strong stench of death from his leather coat, something, musky a perfume perhaps. Was it combined with the smell of human? He glanced around searching for an air freshener or other such device he hadn't seen earlier. His gaze took his attention to the courtyard entrance. A small figure ducked its head out of sight, eyes just peering, spying on him. Fred.   
  
With a casual appearance he stood, stretched and strode casually around the lobby. Fred gathered confidence that he hadn't seen her and moved better into his view, it was raining lightly now and her long hair was turning into tangled clumps. For good measure he inhaled the scent of a plant on a coffee table he had just come to. Turning towards the courtyard to gaze up at the sky he allowed himself a theatrical step back as he pretended to be shocked at Fred's presence there.   
  
Fred' s eyes widened in shock as the vampire's gaze fell on to her. She was even more shocked when he gave her a small shy smile. Her eyes met his unsure, searching for something there, some sign of her friend. She wasn't sure what she saw. When she imagined this moment there were no complexities. All she could see in her dreams were vacant gold eyes, a vicious killing machine. The man she found herself confronting now had emotion in his eyes, he was still Angel, he looked no differently, maybe, maybe Angel was being held inside there still. Trapped inside his demon's hellish mind, just like her when she got trapped in Pylea.   
  
It seemed as though something wasn't quite right. Why were her eyes aching? Why had it suddenly become so hard to blink, to glance away from Angel's eyes? Panic started to rise in her, it filled her, starting somewhere low down in her stomach until she could taste bile in her mouth. He was advancing towards her; soon he had thrust the glass door open. There was nothing protecting her from him except for the small wooden cross she gripped in her sweaty hand.   
  
She swallowed the colour draining from her face as he approached never removing his eyes from hers, holding her trapped, like a deer caught in the strangling hold of headlights. A small sound escaped her throat, it could have been the start of a plea but she would never know. Angelus blinked, releasing her from his hold, she gasped as his hand was raised and the next thing she experienced, was blackness.   
  
…………………………………………………………………………….  
(Next time… What will Angelus do with Fred, a phone call from Cordy reveals her location and the race is on to escape before he gets to Santa Barbara and Buffy gets involved, though she may wish she hadn't.)  
  
Authors note: Hello, please let me know what you think, I'm worried about my Fred characterisation (from what I've wrote of the next chapter) so any tips or help with characterisation, writing style, even grammar, would be hugely helpful. Thanks for getting this far. 


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